A HUMBLING EXPERIENCE OF LEARNING & APPRECIATION:

VISIT TO THE CANCER REHABILITATION WARD:

PLACE OF HOPE AND FAITH DOMINATING OVER PAIN.

CHATTING TO RESIDENTS ABOUT, ALL AND SUNDRY.

NURSES INTERMINGLING ALL ABOUT WITH SMILES.

THINKING:

BUT FOR THE GRACE OF GOD- GO YOU AND I

THE VISITOR EXPERIENCE:

A deeply humbling experience, emphasising the importance of good health.

So many men with missing one limb or maybe two.

Age is no protection or barrier to be a chosen one.

A young man of 19 still has in the rehab shop for 8 months.

Or unable to walk even if they have the full set of limbs.

Having to learn how to make leg muscles to coordinate.

To regain the natural art of walking we all take for granted.

“Medical expertise sits right there on call.

On hand for every need or for every fall.

Life’s natural medicine of reality filled with hope.

To encounter, when morale is down, an urge to mope.

The mood was light, not sad, not dark.

For ever present was the human spark.

The mood was deliberately realistic, with an underlying tone of light.

For staff and patient, the aim was clear, this bloody cancer is in for a fight.”

The funny tale on the way to see the doc.

The banter between me the visitor, my mate and the nurse wheeling our  way to a visit for morning testing with nurses pouring over charts and measures.

Discussing how our wives always walk so fast with purpose, leaving their men folk strolling.

Patient Mate: Yup I used to be the one striding ahead, now I am the one lagging behind my wife.

Wheelchair pushing Nurse: Umm-Not hard, you can’t walk at all at this stage—but you will be mate.

All Three of us: Laughing, making light of the moment as we trundle past so many in the same way.

THE UTE:

See the daily working horse.

Dirty: Never washed of course.

Now sits parked in the shed outback.

With cobwebs formed, the battery flat.

Sits in waiting-waiting for driver to return.

Sitting miles away, for good health he yearns